1 A league administrator will be appointed for each season and their duties will include all scoring, maintenance of rosters, administration of free agency and distribution of information.

2 All disputes within the league wherever possible shall be resolved by a league wide vote with each team having a single vote.

2a Where disputes are time sensitive and it would not be practical to poll the entire league, the administrator has the option to poll up to three
neutral owners in relation to the dispute with a majority providing the final decision

3. No team will be eligible to complete in the league until the annual league fees have been paid, these are to be collected at the time of the annual draft and are to cover the league administration costs.

4. Should an owner resign from the league during the season the following options are available for the league to vote upon

4a Ownership of the team can be transferred to another individual

4b The franchises players are subject to a dispensation draft

Rosters

5. The standard active roster consists of four quarterbacks, five running backs, six wide receivers, two tight ends, two kickers and two defences. These are maximum figures and therefore there is no requirement that rosters are full in order to field an eligible lineup. During pre-season the maximum roster size is a total of 32 roster spots

6. Each team has 4 Injured Reserved roster spaces, a player can only be placed on injured reserve when the transaction has been processed by the players NFL team and has appeared on the NFL transaction report as available at NFL.com/transactions. There are two different designation of injured reserve and will be administered as follows:

6a. A player placed on Injured Reserve is not eligible to return for the rest of the season and will remain on IR until the end of the season a player on IR can be released via the waiver process at any time

6b. A played placed on IR Designated to Return will be eligible to return 8 weeks after been placed on IR, should he be reactivated by his NFL team
after 8 weeks he must either be placed on the active roster or released via the waiver wire system.

7. Each team has one additional available roster space which is reserved for players eligible for selection in that seasons NFL draft, the development roster spot is available for the first 8 weeks of the season. At any point within the 8 weeks a player on the development roster can be activated to the main roster or replaced by another development eligible player.

7a. At any point up until the given players are involved in that weeks game, taking into account the 1hr before kick off deadlines, a transaction can be completed involving a development roster spot eligible players currently on a teams roster. This change must be submitted via email to the league administrator or on the forum before the roster submission deadline

7b After the week 8 deadline to submit the starting lineup all players who still occupy the development roster spot will be automatically released through the waiver system

8. February 28th is the deadline for each team to submit a list of five protected players. No franchise can protect more than two players at any one position. All players that have not been protected will be released into the following seasons draft pool which in addition will consist of the NFL players not on a FFL roster and all players who have entered the NFL through that particular seasons annual NFL player allocation draft or as an undrafted free agent

9. The draft order is predicated on the end of season standings. The eight teams that failed to make the playoffs will be placed in order of the win-loss record with the 1st overall pick going to the team with the best record not to make the playoffs. The playoff teams will be placed in the following order in the draft: Winner - 12th pick, 2nd place - 11th pick, loser of the 3rd v 4th playoff - 10th pick, winner of 3rd v 5th playoff - 9th pick.

10. Should any further expansion of the league occur, amendments to rules 8 & 9 may be required and the mechanisms for expansion and player allocation will be agreed through league wide voting.

11. An individuals players position is determined through their position designation on NFL.com at the start of the season.

12. Any required changes to a roster such as a players NFL team can be logged via email to the league administrator who will then process the detailed changes

Starting Line-ups

13. Each week, a franchise owner, or a proxy should the individual owner be unavailable for a given week, must name a starting line-up that includes the following: one quarterback, three running backs, three wide receivers, one tight end, one kicker and one defence.

13a. If no starting line-up is submitted the previous weeks line up will be automatically used, with the exception of week one where no starters will be allocated.

13b. Any player nominated as a starter the previous week who plays in a game prior to Sunday 1pm and where a lineup has not been set or adjusted this player will automatically be listed as a starter.

14. The deadline for submitting starting line-ups are as follows, any players participating in game prior to Sunday games must be selected or removed from the previous weeks starting lineup 1hr before the kick-off. The remanding players in the line-up must be selected 1hr prior to the kick-off of the 1pm EST Sunday games.

15. Notification of starting lineups must be made via the website. If an owner is unable to access the website for any reason notification can be made via email or phone to the league administrator.

Scoring

16. The scoring for a starting player is detailed on the FFL website under 'Scoring System'.

17. All players on the active roster will contribute to team yardage from scrimmage totals. The team with the highest yardage in a category will be awarded 12 bonus points for that category, the team with the second most yardage will be awarded 11 bonus points and so on. The bonus points will be awarded for Passing, Rushing and Receiving

18. In the playoffs this bonus points system is adjusted, in week one of the playoffs the bonus points are awarded on a 10-7-4-1 basis and in week two the head-to-head matchup are scored on a 5-0 in each yardage category.

19. The statistics used for scoring will be from NFL.com

20.Should any scoring alterations be made by the NFL prior to the deadline for the following weeks waiver claims the scoring from the week in question will be altered and results if necessary

21. There are some scoring anomalies that are not clearly accounted for under the scoring system

21a. An offensive fumble recovery for a TD scores double point for the player

21b. Punt and Kick returns score a TD for defence as well as the player concerned

21c. A lateral is scored as a passing touchdown

League Schedule

22. The regular season comprises of 14 games taking pace over the first 14 weeks of the NFL regular season. With each team playing each other once a season and that every 5 seasons a team will play every team twice in an individual season. In weeks 10 and 13 teams that ate deemed as 'rivals' will play each other with the aggregate score of these games been used to determine that seasons rivalry winners.

23. The top four teams be awarded a playoff berth, with the first place team playing the 4th place team and 2nd placed team playing the 3rd placed team in week one of the playoffs (week 15). Week 16 the two winning teams from the first round will play each other for the FFL Title with the losers playing each other for 3rd and 4th place.

Tie Breakers

24. Should any game be tied on total points the team that wins 2 out of the 3 bonus point categories will be awarded the win

25. All tie breakers will be settled using the following methodology
a. Head- to-head records
b Conference Record
c. Points scored
d. Total yards gained

26. If more than two teams are ties the head-to-head will only apply if one team has swept all meeting with the other two or more teams. Once the first place winner of a tie has been confirmed the remaining tied teams begin the tie breaker process from the start as detailed in rule 25.

Waivers

27. Until midnight on the Wednesday of each week of the season a team may submit a list of players they wish to acquire and the players they wish to be replaced. Waiver wires requests can be submitted via the 'free agency' tab on the website. It is each individual's responsibility to ensure that a request has been submitted, this can be confirmed by going back into the free agency tab and if your text is still there, the submission has been saved. Also it is possible to contact the administrator who can also confirm if the waiver wire claim has been received. No claims received after the deadline will be processed.

28. Players will be allocated to teams depending on their place in the free agency order, once a team is awarded a player they drop to the bottom of the waiver order for the following round of free agency selections

29. All roster signings will be allocated to the rosters and posted on the forum together with the updated free agency waiver list for the following weeks

30. Once free agency has been processed the only transactions possible is the activation of a player from the development roster spot and the release of a relevant player to make room on the active roster

31. Places in the wavier wire order can not be traded

Trading

32. No trading of players and/or draft picks maybe be made after the deadline for week 8 until the culmination of the FFL Bowl

33. Until the week 8 deadline a trade of any number of players and/or draft picks may be made between two or more franchises. Following a trade all of the teams involved must have a standard roster be that through trade or use of the free agency system.

34. No trades will be permitted that include "player to be named later", "future considerations" etc. However deals can have conditional requirements that are dependent on a given players performance.

35. Details of all trades including conditional picks must be submitted via the FFL website "trades" tab.

36. Any player traded during a season cannot be re-acquired by the original franchise until the day of the following free agent/rookie draft.

37. A player who is acquired via the waiver wire system during pre-season can not be traded until after week one of the season has been completed